Decisions, Decisions
by B.A. Tyler
Summary: A few months after the war, Hawkeye’s in New York City for a surgical conference. You determine the outcome.
1. Chapter 1

**Decisions, Decisions**

Hawkeye threw his suitcase onto the bed and took a look around the hotel room. King-size bed, roomy loveseat, ornate lamps, beautiful oak writing desk. He let out an appreciative whistle. Mighty fancy, but that's New York City for you. Everything's a little larger than life in the Big Apple, a bit more luxurious and indulgent than everywhere else.

Beats the hell out of Korea in winter. Or in autumn, spring, or summer, for that matter.

He let out a single laugh and flipped open his suitcase, started to unpack. Two days in New York. Oh, the possibilities that lay ahead…

He pulled the conference itinerary out of his suitcase, stared at it for a couple seconds, then set it aside.

Conference? Did somebody say conference? The little devil on his left shoulder whispered into his ear: "There's nothing they can teach you that you didn't already learn during the War. Surgery's surgery. You're years ahead of the textbooks."

The little angel on his right shoulder lightly smacked the back of his head. "The hospital's paying for this trip. _Of course_ you need to go to the conference!"

Hawkeye sighed as he hung his red bathrobe in the closet. Throughout his life, he'd always had a tendency to listen to the little devil on his shoulder, that was for sure. But the angel did make a compelling case…

He shook his head and unpacked his shaving kit, taking it into the bathroom. His suitcase finally empty, he picked up the phone to call his dad as he'd promised.

"I've arrived, Dad. No problems at all on the drive down here, the weather's great, and the hotel's sinfully ritzy. How are you doing?"

"Fine, Hawkeye. I'm fine. Relieved to hear you made it down there in one piece." There was a pause and a crackle of static over the line. Then, "You _are_ going to attend the conference, aren't you?"

"How can you even ask that, Dad?"

"Because I know you, son. And I couldn't help noticing that you just smoothly sidestepped answering me." He sighed. "It's just that you've only been at Maine Memorial for two months, and I don't want you to get off on the wrong foot with them."

"Probably too late for that, Dad. I don't think they appreciated the fact that I did my rounds as Groucho last week."

"Oh, Hawkeye."

"Don't worry, Dad. They sent me here to learn, and I assure you I'm going to learn."

"Why don't I feel very confident about this?"

"Because I don't inspire confidence," Hawkeye replied cheerfully. "I'll see you in a couple days, Dad."

Unpacked and the requisite phone call to his father out of the way, Hawkeye picked up the conference itinerary again and noted that the seminars kicked off in less than an hour. He glanced out the window, where the bustling, exciting city lay 12 stories below, calling him to come play.

The devil at his left urged, "It's New York City, for Pete's sake. Go play."

The angel on his right scolded, "This is your profession, your vocation, your calling. Go to the conference."

He sat on the bed, still holding the itinerary, and shut his eyes. What to do… what to do…

--

**If you think Hawkeye goes to the surgical conference, proceed to Chapter 2.**

**If you think Hawkeye plays hooky from the conference, proceed to Chapter 3.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Taking the Angel's Advice**

He had just signed in at the registration table when he was startled by: "Hawkeye? Hawkeye Pierce?"

He heard the voice, could even identify the voice, but he didn't know where it was coming from. He whirled around in its general direction.

"It _is_ you!"

And now he saw the person the voice belonged to—none other than B.J. Hunnicutt himself—striding toward him, arms outstretched, grin huge underneath the cheesy moustache.

"Holy shit!" B.J. exclaimed as he pulled a still-stunned Hawkeye into his arms for the world's tightest bear hug. "Why didn't you call and tell me you'd be at this conference?"

"I didn't know until a couple days ago. It never occurred to me I'd run into you—or anyone else I know—here. Geez, d'ya mind, Beej? You're crushing me."

B.J. eased up and stepped back, still smiling that 1000-watt smile of his. Hawkeye smiled right back. Amazing turn of events, when you thought about it. He'd come so close to skipping out on this conference, and if he had, he would've missed running into his best friend…

He began to laugh, softly at first but increasing in loudness until finally he was at full pitch, positively giddy and pulling B.J. back to him for another hug. "Damn, this is a nice surprise! It's great to see you, Beej. I've missed you."

"Me too, Hawk."

Suddenly there was feedback on the P.A., the universal signal that the seminar was about to begin. B.J. pointed to a couple of seats nearby and Hawkeye followed him, still reeling from the surprise but a hell of a lot more thrilled about being here than he'd been a few minutes ago.

About halfway through the second lecture, Hawkeye gave a silent thank-you prayer to the inventor of paper. He and B.J. were passing notes back and forth and giggling like a couple of second-graders.

_That guy's pores are larger than Frank's! I can see them from all the way back here!__  
__  
__And he's even more boring than Charles prattling on about his polo matches. Now __that's__ boring.__  
_  
They were still struggling to stifle their laughter over that one when B.J.'s eyes suddenly went wide and he knocked his knee against Hawkeye's. Hard.

Leaning over, he whispered, "Shit, Hawkeye. Speaking of Charles…" And he pointed up ahead.

Hawkeye craned his neck and sure enough, there was the very bald head of one Charles Emerson Winchester III, sitting several rows in front of them. Hawkeye nearly brayed laughter but somehow managed to maintain control.

"Oh, this is too good, Beej, this is priceless!" he whispered. "We know he's here, but he doesn't know we're here. We've got to use that to our advantage!"

B.J. smirked. "Are you suggesting what I think you're suggesting?"

Hawkeye nudged him with an elbow. "Are you not the 4077th's reigning champion of practical jokes?"

A wicked twinkle appeared in B.J.'s eyes, and Hawkeye knew the game was afoot.

Less than an hour later, they were in the nearest drug store, buying a highly suspicious amount of toilet paper, shaving cream, and lipstick.

B.J. paid for their items and they began walking back to the hotel, Hawkeye laughing almost nonstop in anticipation of their fiendish plot. "No doubt about it, Beej," he said in between chuckles. "This is the best medical conference ever."

"And to think, not that long ago, you were insisting that you'd never attend one in your life. If I know you, you even debated long and hard about coming to this one… didn't you?"

Hawkeye scoffed, though not entirely convincingly. "Who, me?" he said. "Beej, there was never any question…"


	3. Chapter 3

**Taking the Devil's Advice**

It was nearing midnight and Hawkeye was at his third bar. Or was it the fourth? Somehow he'd lost count, but this particular one was the most inviting, because of the very friendly, very sexy woman who'd been using him as a leaning post for the last half hour. Not that he minded, of course. It beat spending his night on the town solo, that's for sure. Her name was Debbie, and she was brunette, curvy, and quite wonderful to look at, but as a conversationalist, she left something to be desired. Not the sharpest scalpel on the tray, you might say.

"You were in Korea? In that war? How awful. Was it awful? I'll bet it was awful."

"Awful," Hawkeye agreed, taking a swig from his beer bottle. He flashed Debbie a smile and was about to steer the discussion to something a little less challenging when the fight broke out.

The two men on Debbie's other side had been arguing about something, and now the disagreement had escalated to a full-fledged fight. With punches, kicks, and something resembling karate jabs, from the looks of it. Hawkeye grabbed hold of Debbie's arm and pulled her away from them, but the men were unavoidable—all arms and legs and flying bodies—and both he and Debbie wound up getting shoved into two other innocent bystanders.

And from that point on, chaos reigned. The entire bar seemed to instantly be involved, and although Hawkeye wanted nothing more than to get out of there, preferably taking Debbie along with him, it was much easier thought than done. He kept getting shoved against people, and then those people shoved him right back, and then fists started to fly toward his face. Poor Debbie seemed to be in a perpetual duck, and then he lost track of her altogether, which only added guilt to an already unpleasant situation.

Five minutes, eight minutes at the most of this mayhem, and then the bar's doors burst open and the sound of whistles pierced the air. Police whistles.

"Oh shit," he said to no one in particular.

And he, along with practically everyone else in the bar, was hauled off to the police station.

A lot of explaining, a lot of humiliation, and a hefty fine later, he dragged himself back to his hotel room. The bedside clock said 4:30 am. He inspected his face in the bathroom mirror and winced. A black eye. How was he going to explain that to his dad? _It was one hell of a violent surgical conference, Dad…_

He threw himself onto the bed, not even bothering to get undressed, and let out a world-weary sigh. He was asleep in no time.

Even if he hadn't slept for 11 hours, he still wouldn't have attended the second day of the surgical conference. The black eye and bruises on his face were far too embarrassing. All he wanted to do was keep to himself.

As he began to pack up his suitcase, the angel on his right shoulder chastised him. "Tsk tsk. I certainly hope you learned your lesson. Serves you right, if I may say so. Should've gone to the conference."

The devil on his left shoulder had a different take on the situation. "Hell, you only live once. You had a pretty good time up until that whole fight thing. Had to be better than some dull-as-dishwater medical conference."

Hawkeye snapped his suitcase closed. "Shut up, both of you," he said out loud, then felt ridiculous that he'd spoken. He shook his head, exasperated at himself, and headed out of the room.

As he checked out at the hotel's front desk, he had no way of knowing that he'd missed running into B.J. Hunnicutt by less than 10 minutes.


End file.
